


Lightning fast panic attacks

by NovemberWings



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers Movie Night, Awesome Jarvis (Iron Man movies), Brotherly Angst, Bullying, Domestic Avengers, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jarvis (Iron Man movies) is a Good Bro, Lonely Loki (Marvel), M/M, Odin (Marvel)'s A+ Parenting, Panic Attacks, Past Child Abuse, Pre-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Thor isn't the greatest brother, slash if you squint?, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-30 09:53:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19850713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NovemberWings/pseuds/NovemberWings
Summary: Loki has been living with Tony for a couple of months now and Tony has been enjoying Loki's presence way more than he thought he was going to.When Tony is expecting to settle down with Loki for a movie night and thunder and lightning causes Loki to have a panic attack they have their first close moment as Tony helps Loki through his panic attack and lets Loki talk about his past.





	Lightning fast panic attacks

There was the faint pattering of rain outside the Stark tower making the night seem almost scenic – like from a bad indie film. Tony had finally reached the bottom of the way too big pile of papers to do with the boring money-stuff of Stark industries and was ready to flop on the couch in front of the tv and introduce Loki to some more of humanities best cinematography. He was pretty sure pizza was in order.

He sighed as he stood up, more from weariness than anything else, and cracked his back.  
“J, where’s Loki?”  
“He’s in the penthouse, sir.”  
“Good.” It meant that he didn’t have to pry Loki out of his room so he could have some company on the couch for the night. Tony didn’t realise how lonely he was until Loki moved in and it felt weird thinking back to when Loki hadn’t been living here, his presence was just so casual now. When Thor had come to his tower completely unannounced, Loki in tow, a few months after the battle of New York there had been some rather negative emotions.

Tony vividly remembered the conversation that the three of them had – or more accurately the shouted argument between himself and Thor while Loki stood there looking tired and a little frightened, completely different to the mad man who invaded New York. Tony had been completely flabbergasted by the notion of Loki having the audacity to ask to come and live with him until Thor had explained that Loki hadn’t been in control during New York.  
He explained that an alien called Thanos had pretty much kidnapped Loki and tortured him before brain washing him and sending him to Earth to do his dirty work. None of it had been Loki’s fault. When Thor had finished explaining that he had continued to say that their father didn’t believe that Loki had been mind-controlled and refused to believe even the most convincing proof put before him – and to be fair despite the proof Tony had still been a little sceptical. Thor, however, had continued to explain that daddy-dearest wouldn’t allow Loki to stay on Asgard and he needed somewhere to go.  
Tony had reluctantly agreed.   
After only a week of living with Loki any doubt in his mind that Loki had been responsible for New York completely vanished from his mind. Yes Loki was smart enough to do something like New York but he wasn’t cruel or maniacal. He was soft and quite compassionate – who had looked overly concerned when he saw Tony chastising Dummy until he explained that it was all a bit of a joke. In fact, Loki aligned more with Thor’s childhood stories of Loki seeming more like a geek and a quiet book worm.

Which Tony had discovered very quickly about Loki. Loki started reading everything in the house – even the boring non-fiction books until Tony had given him a Stark pad to buy books on there. He spends most of his time reading and drinking herbal tea.  
“He’s not reading is he?” Tony said as he stepped into the lift, not really wanting to drag Loki away from his book, even though Loki insisted that he was fine with it he still felt like a bit of a jerk randomly demanding his housemate’s attention.  
“No, sir.” Jarvis responded, much to Tony’s surprise.  
“Oh. What’s he doing then?” He frowned, unsure what Loki would possibly be doing – he wasn’t overly fond of the tv so…?  
“He’s not doing anything. He’s just sitting there.”  
“Okay…” Well, this was a mystery. It took another few seconds before the door opened to the penthouse. Jarvis was right.

Loki was sitting on the sofa – perfectly still – staring out the large window opposite him. The lights were off and the room felt scarily still. The only light in the room was dull glow from the city and the random bursts of sharp bright light of lightning.  
“Loki?” He asked stepping out of the lift, but he got no response. Not even a shift in his body – his shoulders not loosing any of the tension that he could see so clearly beneath the cotton t-shirt he was wearing. Tony felt concern on his face as he started to walk towards Loki, who still hadn’t turned to look at him.

When he reached him he gently said his name again before putting a gentle hand on his shoulder and the reaction was instant. Loki flinched sharply under his touch, ducking his head down before standing up from the couch and turning to look at Tony with wide eyes.  
“I’m sorry. Please. I didn’t do anything. I’m sorry.” His tone was panicked and pleading, his expression frantic. He had hair falling in his face, which he hadn’t seemed to notice and his breaths were heavy and too quick.  
“Loki?” Tony said raising his hands in front of him to show he meant no harm.  
“Please. I’m sorry.” Loki’s eyes started flitting around the room as if looking for something, and suddenly it dawned on Tony that Loki wasn’t with him right now. He was somewhere else in his mind and if on queue a rumble of thunder sounded – making a sob leave Loki’s lips.

Quickly Tony padded around to the other side of the sofa and walked up to Loki.  
“Loki, listen. It’s me. Tony.” He said clicking his finers in front of Loki’s eyes – which made him flinch but soon after his eyes seemed to focus and come back to reality again – only confirmed by Loki’s shaky voice.  
“Tony?”  
“Yeah. Good. You’re on Midgard with me right now, like you have been for the past few months. What’s caused this?” He thought he had a pretty good guess but he wanted to make sure. It took a few moments before Loki whispered, as if it were a terrifying secret;  
“Thunder.”  
“Okay, that’s alright. Just come with me.” He took Loki’s arm, which made Loki whimper a little – and Tony cringe, he had never liked people being afraid of him but right now he needed to get Loki away from what was causing his panic attack.  
“Please.” Loki said to him quietly as Tony started walking him over to the lift. “I’m sorry. Please I didn’t mean to.”  
“I know. It’s okay. Nothing’s going to happen.” The lift opened without him even needing to push the button. The stepped inside and Loki pressed the button for the basement, making the lift shoot down – Jarvis had slowed the speed of the lift. Loki had never liked the lifts and the slight vertigo you can get from them and always preferred to take the stairs, but right now he was in no condition to walk down about 70 flights of stairs.

The doors soon pinged open to reveal the parking lot underneath the tower. Tony gently pulled Loki into the garage and took out his keys aiming it at the limo which bleeped as the car unlocked. He opened the door and guided Loki inside and shut the door.

Loki was still breathing oddly so Tony took Loki’s hand and placed it on his own chest.  
“Here, Loki, breath with me. Look at me.” He instructed before taking deep exaggerated breathing – and while it took quite a long time and a lot of reassuring Loki that he hadn’t done anything wrong Loki finally got his breathing under control.  
“Why are we in your long car?” He asked frowning – making Tony smile a little. Loki always seemed to have a habit of asking really random and inappropriate things given the situation.  
“It’s a party limo so it’s soundproofed. No noise getting in or out of this baby.” He said knocking on the wall of the limo.  
“Oh.” There was a beat of silence before Loki asked; “how did you know what to do?”  
“You were having a panic attack. I used to get them quite a lot and I just did for you what Pepper, Happy and Rhodey used to do for me.” He shrugged. “Can I ask…” He said before trailing off guessing that it wasn’t the most appropriate time to ask this.  
“You can ask anything you want Tony.”  
“Well…” He hesitated again before decided that it would be okay, “I just wanted to ask what about the thunder gives you a panic attack?” The word ‘thunder’ made Loki hitch his breath a little but he let out a slow calming breath.  
“When we were younger Thor was still learning how to control his powers and you know that he can control the weather and everything but when we were younger he hadn’t quite mastered the interplay of his emotions with the powers and whenever he was angry or upset it would thunder and lightning so bad it seemed the sky may fall upon Asgard.” Loki went quiet for a moment clearly remembering while Tony waited patiently for him to continue.   
“And when Thor was mad I knew about it. Thor was a vicious and violent child who delighted in ‘battles’ and triumphs and his friends were very similar. So when Thor was mad he usually sought someone to take his anger out on. Father told him, when he had first started acting out against the servants and slaves of the castle, that it was unkinglike to act like that towards the ordinary folk so Thor had turned his rage to me. I was the perfect target.” He let out a little bitter laugh, “I was smaller and my talents didn’t lie in the physical realm of strength but more the magical – a skill that’s considered weak and feminine.” His tone turned icy, “so I could never win. I couldn’t win in a physical fight and if I used my magic I would be ridiculed – and if father found out I was using magic he would have gone mad. So he and his friends used to play with me as a cat does to a mouse before finally ending the game and eating it. I expected father to step in and tell them to stop but I suppose that it was better than having Thor attacking the staff…” He paused looking at the floor of the limo. Even in the dull light of the car Tony could see the amount of emotion on his face.  
“And when Thor was upset rather than angry it was always I who got blamed for his ill mood. I was rarely the true cause but that didn’t matter. Father just needed to be seem to take action. You see Tony,” He said looking Tony in the eyes, “father had a staff to show his greatness and he used to beat me with it. He used to say that if he beat me with a prestigious and important stick it may beat some prestige and importance into me alongside discipline.” He blinked rapidly to get rid of the tears that had started to grow in his eyes. “It just hurt a lot.”  
“So… Long story short really… I guess whenever I hear thunder it just means pain…” He shrugged.

Tony blinked – a little stunned at how much Loki had suddenly opened up to him. Yes he had been there for a while but they had never spoken like this. This was all new and Tony was horrified. Suddenly every childhood story Thor had told him – about all the fun he used to have with his friends and about how Loki never truly fitted in suddenly became a lot more clear now he had every side of the story.

If there had been any tiny specs of doubt in Tony’s mind this cleared it up immediately. Loki isn’t a psychopath who invaded New York but instead a lonely kid bullied by his brother and abused by his father… and at least the latter Tony could relate to.

“Loki I’m so sorry. You shouldn’t have gone through that.”  
“I know.” He shrugged a little. “but I survived that’s what mattered.” He let out a watery chuckle.  
“Yeah you did. You survived because you’re strong and important, Loki. It’s shitty what Thor did and its even more shitty what your dad did. Honestly, fuck them both.”  
“Yeah.” Loki laughed light, “fuck those guys am-I-right.” Loki drawled in a bad American accent.  
“Ew. Never do that again.” Tony laughed.  
“Deal.” They both grinned at one another before Tony suggested.  
“Hey, do you want to watch something in here? There’s a tv.” And on queue Jarvis lowered a large tv down for the ceiling where it had been tucked away. “What do you want to watch?”  
“Something happy and silly.” Loki shrugged.  
“J?”  
“On it, sir.” Within a few seconds Queer Eye’s opening credits started. Quickly Tony explained the premise of the show as he shuffled over to sit next to Loki rather than opposite him, making Loki smile. As the fab five came onto the screen Tony said;  
“Sorry I haven’t got snacks in here.”  
“No. This is perfect.” Loki said as he leant into Tony’s side.

**Author's Note:**

> Seriously random drabble. I just got back from seeing Spiderman FFH and it was super good but I had such a nostalgia moment.  
> Remember when the biggest problems in the MCU were who people shipped more. Like Stucky or Stony. FrostIron or The science bros.  
> Remember how we all knew that the avengers lived together in stark tower and not every avengers fanfiction was entirely soul-destroying and depressing.  
> Remember the good ol' days?
> 
> I just remembered the bit in The Avengers when Cap is like;  
> 'What? you scared of a little lightning?' And decided to massively over analyse it and write a 2000 word fic about it.  
> But I hope you enjoyed it and please leave a comment so I know I'm not the only one who still ships Loki and Tony! and wants more fics about them all living in the tower and having movie nights!


End file.
